The Quiet Dismantling of Social Media Censorship

By Sayer Ji, Special to The MAHA Report

* Adapted from a recent post by Sayer Ji on his Substack

Without fanfare, YouTube quietly reinstated two voices it once silenced as purveyors of “misinformation” during the pandemic: activist Ronnie “Rizza” Islam; and me, Sayer Ji – founder of GreenMedInfo and co-founder of Stand For Health Freedom.

Rizza and I were part of the notorious “Disinformation Dozen,” at this point a badge of honor. Now, years later, YouTube admits neither of us ever violated the platform’s rules. This stunning reversal carries weight far beyond our individual accounts. It symbolizes a broader collapse of the credibility of the censorship regime deployed during the pandemic, and it vindicates those of us who warned that lawful speech was being unjustly suppressed under government pressure.

Earlier this year, Alphabet Inc. – the parent company of Google and YouTube – acknowledged in an official letter to Congress that it had removed content, not because it was false or unlawful, but due to coercion from federal officials. Alphabet’s own lawyers admitted: “Senior Biden Administration officials... pressed the Company regarding certain user-generated content related to the COVID pandemic that did not violate its policies.” They added: “It is unacceptable and wrong when any government, including the Biden Administration, attempts to dictate how the Company moderates content.”

The “Disinformation Dozen” Smear Exposed

For Rizza and I, reinstatement after four years is more than personal vindication – it exposes the “Disinformation Dozen” campaign as a politically motivated falsehood.

Back in 2021, a UK-based group called the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) published a report falsely claiming that 12 individuals were responsible for 65% of anti-vaccine content online. That list put me in the company of not only Rizza but also Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The White House and multiple senators leaned on social media companies to remove our accounts.

YouTube complied, banning Rizza and me without citing specific policy violations. Now YouTube acknowledges our content never breached any standards — a tacit admission that their censorship was politically induced, not rule-based.

From Pariah to Public Servant

Perhaps the most striking illustration of this policy shift relates to Kennedy, who was once smeared as a super-spreader of misinformation and now serves as Secretary of Health and Human Services. In 2024, RFK Jr. lost a legal case against YouTube because he lacked evidence that the government had coerced the platform to censor him. That proof now exists.

It turns out the people once labeled ‘dangerous’ were in many cases telling inconvenient truths. Their reinstatement is a symbolic collapse of the narrative used to justify mass censorship.

Free Speech as the Foundation of Health Freedom

This reversal is a victory for the MAHA movement, which champions medical freedom — a freedom that cannot exist without free speech. You can’t make informed medical choices if you don’t have all the information. Free expression is essential to informed consent, to scientific discovery, and to a functioning democracy.

Thomas Jefferson once warned, “Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.” Today, those words resonate powerfully.

In a recent MAHA Media Hub broadcast, I spoke about the government’s free speech reversal as more than a legal or political event—it’s a spiritual and cultural one. Reinstating our voices is not just about algorithms and policies; it marks a reawakening of human sovereignty and reminds us that freedom, joy, and truth are inseparable.

Big Tech’s About-Face

In a remarkable twist, Alphabet is now asking for protection from censorship under the European Union’s new Digital Services Act (DSA). In the same letter to Congress, the company warned that the DSA could be interpreted to require platforms to remove lawful content — and that this posed a threat to free expression both inside and outside of the EU.

The irony is unmistakable. After spending years suppressing lawful speech under government pressure, Big Tech is now seeking protection from the very overreach it once enabled.

A Call to Defend Liberty

Our reinstatement is a blessing and a turning point. But full accountability remains. A federal lawsuit — Finn et al. v. Global Engagement Center, et al. — is underway, with Rizza, I and others determined to win retributive justice for the deplatforming and defamation we endured.

This case will test whether America still honors its most cherished constitutional amendment, the First Amendment. It will determine if powerful interests can erase citizens from the digital town square with impunity and if those wrongs can be righted.

Now is the time to support our lawsuit, to share this story, and to keep fighting to ensure that none of us, ever again, is censored as we were during the pandemic.

One final note: soon it will also be time to more thoroughly examine how during the pandemic governments weaponized technology to control speech. Such control migrated from platform enforcement to formal legal mechanisms, including outside of the U.S. —where, in a foreign jurisdiction, I became the target of legal tactics for the alleged “crime” of speaking truthfully about my own persecution. That episode, and the methods behind it, will be documented in due course.

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